Crossing the Gates of Hell, I mean... Brisbane

Ever get that feeling when you meet someone new that the relationship just isn't going to go any where? Like you don't see the world in the same way, so why bother? And from that point forward, everything they did annoyed you immensely?

Welcome to Brisbane, Australia.

We got off on the wrong foot and have been club-footing it down the street ever since.

When I got to Brisbane, I had my first run-in with the unfortunate repercussions of being a solo female traveler. I won't go into it, just remember that I am a smart, ex-bartender, female with confidence and "balls" and I was in no danger.

The hostel I chose is a large one, resembling the size of a normal college dorm. In the world of hostels, what does that mean? No personality. It’s very hard to find your place in an accommodation this large. It’s never the same faces and everyone seems to have their own agenda. There are 30 people in the kitchen at any given time, as opposed to 3. The crowd is young, for the most part, there isn't as much eclectic ness and people aren’t as friendly.

I just wasn't feeling this place.

Next day, I did what I normally do when I get to a new destination, walk. I walked for only a short while, this is the littlest biggest city I've ever been in. Brisbane is situated on the banks of the Brisbane River. Stuffed suffocatingly on it's banks are a small botanical gardens, lots of bike and walking paths, some tall buildings that house mostly shopping and offices and, that's about it.

There is nothing "special" about this city. There is no character to it. You don't walk out on to the streets of Brisbane and feel the city. It’s just blah...not interesting. Sorry to all those I'm about to insult but, here is another SAT question:

Q: Sydney is to Charleston as Brisbane is to __________ ?

A: Columbia.

Brisbane, the armpit of Australia.

I think I've demonstrated my discontent with this city. The only reason I even came to Brisbane was for a rendezvous point for a tour of Fraser Island which turned out to be the root of my contempt of this place.

Since I decided to airport hop my way up the east coast as opposed to bus stop hop, I had to pick and choose my stops around the cheapest, therefore largest, airports. Fraser Island, one of the reasons I'm on this continent, is closest to Brisbane airport. You can tour it on 1, 2, 3, etc. day trips that leave the city of Brisbane and return. I booked myself on one of the 2 day, one night tours, got myself to Brisbane via bus from Byron Bay, planned to go on the tour, spend one night on Fraser, come back and spend one more day in B-Vegas, then fly from here to Cairns.

Sounds simple, well thought out, fool proof even. Right... It's day 13 on my solo trip and I hadn't had one hiccup yet. (The brief 2 minutes where I thought I lost my passport in the Jo'Burg airport doesn't count...) I was due for one.

The tour was leaving at 7:30 am from the bus station about 8 blocks away. I had made that walk already (see the first aforementioned paragraph above about why I hate this city) and knew it would take me about 30 minutes. So, I was awake early (habit of hostel sleeping,) ate breakfast, checked out of the hostel and was headed to the bus station ahead of schedule. Good. Great. No problems. I get to the station, go to where I need to wait and do so for about 30 minutes (remember, I was early.) I'm sitting, waiting, looking at the clock and realizing that its now 8 o'clock. These guys are 30 minutes late! I look at my notes I have written down to see if I got something wrong.

"Meeting time, 7:30 am... place, Roma Street bus station... date,
Wednesday, October 24th... Wednesday the 24th. Is today Wednesday?
(So, I look at the calendar on my cel phone...) Hmm... today is Tuesday the
23rd? Really? I could have sworn it was Wednesday today! Silly
me, I must be traveling too hard, getting my days mixed up! I'll just act
like nothing happened and go back to the hostel and figure out what to do today
here in Brisbane. I can't believe I got up so early today for
nothing!!! That's ok, tomorrow it’s Fraser Island!!!"

So, I do just that. I go back to the hostel to talk with check-in and explain to them why I was checking back in. While walking those 8 blocks, 30 minutes, back to the hostel, I am thinking over the past few days in my head.

"See, I left Sydney on a Saturday, got to Byron that evening... stayed at
Byron on Sunday, but left Monday instead of Tuesday because there was
nothing to do in Byron... mailed my package on Monday from Byron, that was
the 22nd... so if Monday was the 22nd, then Tuesday was the 23rd,
then... HOLY SHIT!!! TODAY IS WEDNESDAY the 24th!!! Oh my
god, Lindsey you idiot!!!"

Yes. Somehow I managed to *%@! up my days and missed the rendezvous!!! I couldn't believe myself, I was so upset. Not only did I miss one tour I was looking forward to the most on this trip, but now I had to spend one extra day in this damned city of Brisbane!

That's not the worst, though.

I get back to the hostel, explain why I'm there again only 2 hours after I checked out and got a room for the night. Then, I figured I should explain myself to the tour operators and plead for a refund. I call the number I had for the company and when I say my name and why I'm calling, the man tells me that they've been looking for me all morning! Apparently, I didn't leave a phone number on my order form, so they couldn't call me. The tour was, at this point, too far away to come back to get me and he also regretted to inform me that he would be unable to give me a refund. While I'm fighting back tears of self-frustration and anger, I apologized to this man for my inconvience to his tour and said thanks anyways. I hung up the phone and lost it. I guess the stress of the morning, my (at this point) sheer hatred for the city of Brisbane and everything associated with it, and a few other things on my mind had gotten to me and I just cried. I told myself that at least it wasn't a plane ride to another country and that things could be worse, somehow.

I calmed myself down after a while and went inside to the "Things to Do" desk and spoke to the very nice woman behind the counter about what happened this morning and how I was looking for something to do in this god forsaken city of hers (with more or less words.) I suggested bike riding along the river (to release some of my stress,) she suggested the zoo. As I kept returning to the fact that I had missed a tour of Fraser Island, the only reason I'm in this city, she mentioned that they book Fraser Island tours too. I told her I wasn't here long enough for another tour, I leave Friday.

"Friday? wait...that's two days away, and my flight doesn't leave
Brisbane until 9:30 at night, the tour will be back before then! I can
still go!!!"

So, I bit the bullet, accepted my f*@! up and bought another tour to Fraser Island, after a very detailed inspection of my schedule next to a real calendar. Now that I was all set up for tomorrow, I still had to plan my day today. The city of Brisbane doesn't offer much of "lets just walk around and see what we can see today" kind of possibilities. I did all of those yesterday. So, the only other thing that Brisbane has to offer is the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary. It's sort of a petting zoo of Aussie animals for all ages. And their claim to fame? You guessed it! You can hold koalas! And get your picture taken with them, no less! So, if I didn't feel like a tourist signing myself up for this event, then I didn't know what a tourist was.

The hostel runs a shuttle to the park once a day and I signed myself up for it. I figured, if I was in a crappy mood, then holding a koala while smiling like a goon for the camera would only cheer me up. The only other people going from the hostel were a French kid who spoke almost no English and his mom who spoke very broken English. She was a chatty lady and I ended up walking around with them and talking about koalas, kangaroos and travel around the world while laughing with her and correcting her broken English. Turns out she's been to most places I've only dreamed of going and mentioned places I've never even considered.

So, I was able to hold a koala, get quasi-attacked by an emu, feed a kangaroo and get over my bad mood all in an afternoon spent in a big kid petting zoo in the company of a French lady and her son. Not what I expected when I woke up. I had a great time.



"A dingo ate my baby!!!" (This is a dingo, everyone.)

Now, you may be thinking that I softened up a bit to the city after my koala encounter. Not true. Still at annoyed as ever with the place. I got back to the hostel and was trying to find a tapas bar/restaurant where I could eat a little food, drink a glass of wine or two and put Brisbane behind me. I found one in a part of the city I hadn't been to yet, The Valley (short for Fortitude Valley,) that just so happened to be a few blocks behind the hostel. Directly behind the hostel is Brisbane's version of Chinatown (about one block worth of Asian cuisine) and hadn't appealed to me since my initial exploration of it, so I never ventured past it. The Valley is Brisbane's "artsy" district. There are loads of trendy restaurants and bars, small boutiques with up-and-coming fashion and furniture designers, art galleries and (a personal fav of mine) graffiti that could be deemed as art.

That is what finally softened me up to Brisbane. I finally found something in this city that I could relate to and I felt a little more comfortable in this place. I had tried to give Brisbane the benefit of the doubt earlier, but with all the things going wrong, I wasn't able to muster the strength. Even though I decided against the tapas bar, I was happy I decided to walk out of the box and into the Valley.

Tomorrow I leave for Fraser Island (for real this time) and eventually on Friday, I'm off to Cairns. I think I got the f*@! up out of my system, so I'll be ok the rest of the time in Oz. (Cross those fingers...) I get to start over again in South America, new set of rules. By the way, 10 days until I touch the 5th continent of my travel career. I'm stoked! Soloman better be knocking on my door when I get back to the states!!!

So, now that I have spent some time with Brisbane, got the conversation started and found a few things in common, I've come to the conclusion that even though Brisbane and I's relationship is not going to go anywhere, it isn't all that annoying and I could probably put up with it for a while, just a little while.

Linds

Ps – My beloved Silversun Pickups have also visited the Koala Sanctuary.

PS- There is a picture of me holding a koala floating around out there on the internet. When I find it, I'll post it.